Review: Helios – Yume

HeliosYume

Unseen MusicStreet: 09.11Helios = Sigur Rós x Brian Eno x amiina

When people say that the most beautiful things come from unexpected places, I have to wonder if they were experiencing something like this album. I wonder if their experience with raw beauty caused the same emotional reaction that this album provoked in me. When one encounters something this unabashedly organic and breathtakingly unfiltered, it becomes hard to describe what specifically brought on such feelings of awe. I’m not sure if it’s a culmination of personal events that brought on this reaction or if Helios are really able to tap into the psyche of their listeners to create a piece that seems hand-tailored to each listener’s current experiences. Maybe it’s the deliberate use of humanistic elements (i.e. piano benches creaking, car doors slamming, etc.), combined with perfectly timed cinematic crescendos or just the fact that my current state is an emotional wreck, but the immediate physical reaction that occurred upon the first listen is something that I may never again experience in my life. It would be a disservice to the musicians involved to merely write it off as excellent production and masterful composition. The craft required to produce something this otherworldly—yet somehow rooted in the tangible universe—is nothing short of a post-classical phenomenon. –Allison Shephard